EXCLUSIVE: Carrie Underwood Talks Writing Party Songs for Women

Her latest release “Love Wins,” which plays on the latter half of the album has her singing striking lyrics that celebrate hope overcoming all the world’s plights. Written by Marc Beeson, Andy Albert and Allen Shamblin, “The Bullet” is a heart-wrenching ballad about the tragedy of outliving children and good lives taken unnecessarily by gun violence.

But when CMT.com asked Underwood what the hardest lyric was for her to write on Cry Pretty, she said it was surprisingly for one of her groovy party songs on the album, “Southbound.”

“I don’t know if there was one specific line that was the hardest to write,” Underwood says, “but there was a song called ‘Southbound,’ that was kind of surprisingly hard to write for being just a fun light song. But because it was a fun party song it was interesting just to write it not from some [guy] singing it. It’s a lot easier to write a party song if you’re a guy.”

Underwood knows what she’s talking about. “Last Name,” “Cowboy Casanova,” “Undo It,” “Dirty Laundry” and the behemoth hit “Before He Cheats” have all evolved into country party standards. Her goal with “Southbound” was to have a fun upbeat song that didn’t objectify women like today’s party anthems by male performers sometimes do.

“It’s a party song about being at the lake, having a great time, and people are drinking redneck margaritas,” she says. “We have this one character — her name’s Katie — and we were trying to say she’s had a little too much to drink, but we wanted to make sure Katie was still just having fun and it was respectable and it wasn’t [trashy].

“I’m not going to be like, ‘cutoff jeans,’ you know what I mean? There are certain lyrics that it’s like guys can get away with, and it’s easier. We had to spend a little more writing this fun song.”

Underwood co-wrote nine of Cry Pretty’s 13 songs. She will receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Sept. 20.